Seismic engineering at Kaiser Hospital

Kaiser Permanente is building a new hospital complex at Macarthur and Broadway, including this structure. The design is intended to keep the hospital fully functional after a major earthquake.

That explains the sturdy steel, but also note the number of diagonal braces.

These braces are not rigid, the way they are in scaffolding. Instead, they are built like pistons, with the ends allowed to move inside the sleeve. They absorb energy and help damp the structure against rhythmic shaking that can destroy it. They deform to help save the rest of the framework. That way, after the quake they can be swapped out to make the building as good as new. Read more at this manufacturer’s site, for example. If you’re passing by the hospital (or any construction site, for that matter), take a look.

The big earthquake will probably cause cosmetic damage to the outside of the building, and some broken windows and so on. The hospital as a working institution, though, will not just endure but keep on saving lives without interruption. This is a big deal, and all of California’s hospitals are following suit to meet the state’s deadline of 2030 (see the pamphlet “California’s Hospital Seismic Safety Law” for details).

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This entry was posted on 10 December 2010 at 3:22 pm and is filed under Earthquakes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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